Mystery Writing

Imprints for Success

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0383 Lee Goldberg ecover King City_14 (1)For a while now, the editors at New York publishing companies have been warning authors who are thinking of jumping ship to one of Amazon Publishing's imprints that not only won't their books be in brick-and-mortar stores, but they also won't make nearly as much money. 

"You'll disappear," they say. "Your career will be over. Nobody will be able to find your books anymore."

While it's true that you won't see many Amazon-imprint books at your local Barnes & Noble or at airport bookstores….so what? Ebooks are outselling prints books today. And while your ego may take a hit not seeing your book on a store shelf, your wallet won't. Unless you're an A-lister like Lee Child, Janet Evanovich, James Patterson, or Michael Connelly, etc., you will sell a lot more books and make a lot more money with Amazon than with a "legacy" publisher.

I know many authors, formerly with NY publishers, who are now with one of Amazon's imprints…and earning more than they ever did before. I'm one of them. KING CITY has already made me more money in the last 90 days than my last two MONK novels combined.

But I am not alone. Today Amazon Publishing exec Jeff Belle sent a letter to agents telling them what we Amazon authors already knew…that the imprints are a huge success. He also punctured the big lie, which I have heard repeated many times, that Barry Eisler made a costly mistake walking away from a $500,000, two-book St. Martin's contract in favor of working with Amazon. Belle said, in part:

We are especially focused on increasing the audience for our authors. The Detachment, by Barry Eisler, published last September by Thomas & Mercer, has sold over three times the copies of any of Barry’s previous New York Times bestselling books. New York Times bestselling author Connie Brockway joined Montlake Romance as our launch author, and The Other Guy’s Bride has also gone on to sell more than three times the copies of her other recent titles. These authors, along with Amazon Publishing, are helping to redefine what it means to be a bestseller. We’re extremely proud of the results so far.

We are as determined as ever to make sure that Amazon Publishing authors reach a huge audience. In particular, we will continue to heavily market and promote them to our 180 million customers around the world, through online and offline advertising, our websites, through email, and on millions of Kindle and non-Kindle devices. Based in large part on our long experience as a bookseller, we are confident that this expansive marketing and promotional support will continue to yield strong sales results for our authors.

It's not just the sales that are attractive to authors… it's the talented, friendly and enthusiastic editors, who give authors an enormous say in how their books are packaged and marketed…it's the astonishing effectiveness of their promotional campaigns…and its the far more generous royalties, paid swiftly, and accompanied by clear, easy to understand royalty reports. Amazon Publishing treats authors like partners. And they publish great books.

Is it any wonder Amazon Publishing and their authors are doing so well?

It’s the Story, Stupid

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TOP SUSPENSE BLOG HEADER 3Seems to me that authors are losing track of what really matters… not the formatting, covers, tweeting, pinning and promotion…it's the story, stupid. I blog about it today at Top Suspense. Here's an excerpt:

I’ve listened to new writers at conferences or while lurking on writers’ boards and the newbie writers seem obsessed with everything except what matters most: the writing.

I believe it’s that misguided obsession that s leading to the ethical scandals we’ve been seeing lately… like John Locke who hired people to buy his books and write fake reviews (to artificially boost his rankings and acclaim) to establish himself… and Stephen Leather and RJ Ellory who both used “sock-puppets” on Amazon and social media to generate false buzz and fake reviews to boost their popularity and attack their "rivals."

What authors need to remind themselves is that all of that formatting, pricing, tweeting, social networking, etc. is meaningless if you don’t know how to tell a good story, create compelling characters, develop a strong voice, set a scene, establish a sense of place, or manage point-of-view.

I rarely hear writers anymore talking about the pluses and minuses of out-lining, the importance of an active protagonist, the different kinds of conflict, or the elements of structure. The craft of writing has taken a backseat to the business of publishing.

Busy Bee Lee

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2012-06-05 14.23.40smallerSorry I have been so absent around here lately… the last few weeks have been intensely busy for me. Here's a quick run-down…with pictures. 

I turned in my 15th, and final, Monk book — MR. MONK GETS EVEN  — to Penguin/Putnam on June 1st, then jetted off to Book Expo America in New York, where I got to hang out with my friends at Amazon Publishing and Brilliance Audio, talk shop with scores of authors (including fellow "Amazon" authors Blake Crouch, Vincent Zandri, Johnny Shaw, Robert Pobi, Deborah Reed, David Hewson, Robert Kroese, etc), and meet Audie-award nominees Patrick Lawlor (the voice behind my book KING CITY) and Luke Daniels (the voice behind the audio version of THE DEAD MAN, THE WALK). (That's me on the convention floor with Mike Holmes, a HGTV celeb that my wife adores)

From New York, I headed to Kentucky, to direct a DEAD MAN music video that I wrote for Amazon to go along with the terrific theme song written & performed by Matt Branham. 

And now I'll digress… on the flight, I was stuck in an aisle seat right next to the toilet…so close, I could have peed into it from my chair.If that wasn't bad enough, a morbidly fat woman sat down next to me and couldn't fit into her seat…so she had to lift up her armrest to spill her blubber onto me. I found myself sitting at an angle, tilted towards the bathroom, which a guy promptly rushed into after take-off to have a gastrointestinal explosion of historic proportions. The fat woman quickly fell asleep…and proceeded to loudly fart her way ac160 Dead Man, Tell City, Indiana, Alex Booty, Misty Sisco, Silvio Busch, Aaron Taylorross the midwest. It was hell.  I didn't know whether to put my earplugs in my nose or my ears. When we finally landed, she asked me how the flight was. I told her we lost two engines but she managed to keep us in the air. She had no idea what I was talking about, but at least I amused myself.

Okay, back to the video. We shot in and around Tell City, Indiana, and at the Hawesville, Kentucky stage of Firelight Entertainment Group, the extremely talented and industrious folks I worked with on my short film Bumsicle. Our DEAD MAN cast included Silvio Wolf Busch and Misty Sisco and we had a blast. (That's Misty and Silvio in the center, between the two monsters. You can see a lot more pictures on the Firelight site and their Facebook page)

The day after wrapping the music video I had to jump into my duties as honorary co-chair of the International Mystery Writers Festival in Owensboro, where I played host to the legendary Firesign Theatre and authors (and now fellow Kentucky Colonels) Max Allan Collins, Barbara Collins, Robert Randisi, Christine Matthews and Libby Hellmann and moderated a panel on writing James Bond novels with Raymond Benson and Jeffrey Deaver.

IMG_1724The highlight of the Festival was a night-time, out-door screening of my Owensboro-set short films Remaindered and Bumsicle, which drew over 500 people to Riverpark Center on the banks of the Ohio River. It was fantastic…and I am so glad that the cast and crew of those films, including actors Todd Reynolds, Rick Montgomery, and Eric Altheide, were able to be there to see the enthusiastic audience response. (That's Todd on screen)

As if that wasn't a big enough thrill for me, at the annual Angie Awards ceremony that capped the Festival, my friends at Riverpark Center surprised  me with a portrait by Aaron Kizer, the incredibly talented "speed artist."  It was a wonderful gift and a great honor.

Kiser Portrait of leeCroppedAnd all of that was just the first three weeks of June.

July has been much slower… at least in terms of travels…since I've mostly been sitting at my desk, working on my book with Janet Evanovich, who flew into L.A. last week to be a guest on The Talk, which gave us a chance to get together for a wonderful dinner.

I'm also in the midst of editing THE DEAD MAN video with Firelight's Rachael Nunn (the footage looks great!) and reading entries in the "You Can Write a DEAD MAN Novel" contest, which ends on August 1st.

In other words, don't be surprised if I don't have a lot of time to contribute to the blog…

Robert B. Parker is Alive and Well

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144758592Ace Atkin has pulled off a miracle. With LULLABY, he has managed not only to pitch-perfectly capture Robert B. Parker's voice and narrative pace, but also his story-telling structure, without once slipping into pastiche or parody. LULLABY rings absolutely true to Parker, and you only have to look at the first few pages of Michael Brandman's excreble Jesse Stone novel to see just how hard that is to pull off.

Moreover, LULLABY is even better than the last few of Parker's own Spenser novels. While LULLABY isn't as good as the early Spensers, it certainly fits right in with the mid-stream stuff, the period roughly between STARDUST and POTSHOT, which still makes it a wonderfully entertaining and satisfying read. It's as if Parker, not far from the top of his game, is still with us. It makes me wish Atkins would take on Jesse Stone, too.

In Pursuit of Spenser

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In-pursuit-of-spenserToo many of my good friends contributed to In Pursuit of Spenser, a collection of essays about Robert B. Parker and his writing,  for me to be unbiased or, conversely,  too critical in my review. 

The line-up of authors that editor Otto Penzler assembled for the book includes Loren D. Estleman, Parnell Hall, Brendan DuBois, Gary Phillips, Lawrence Block, Dennis Lehane, Max Allan Collins, SJ Rozan, Jeremiah Healy, Ed Gorman, Reed Farrel Coleman, and Spenser's new author, Ace Atkins.

I'll just say that some of the essays are much stronger than others and don't quite jell as a whole.  There's a great, indepth book to be written about Parker and his work and this isn't quite it. For the most part, this book just skims the surface, but I get the sense that's exactly what Penzler was going for. Something as breezy and light as Parker's fiction. 

At times, the book reads more like an extended memorial, what friends and admirers might have stood up at the podium to say at Parker's service, had they been given the chance. And it's those essays in particular, the more personal ones from Lehane and Block, that are the most entertaining and revealing.  Block obviously admired Parker's craftmanship but also didn't pull any punches. You can read his chapter here.  

Talking Shop

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IMG_1121[1]For me, Left Coast Crime in Sacramento this past weekend was more of a craft and business conference, very friendly, low-key, and collegial (but very well attended, btw. It was packed). I only went to one panel besides the three that I was on — I spent most of my time in the lobby, bar, and area restaurants talking shop with other authors. 

We talked about craft — how we do what we do — and I was surprised by how many of my colleagues aren't outlining any more (but not surprised by how often they end up having to abandon books mid-way through or do page-one rewrites once they are done with their first drafts).  It was also interesting learning the different ways they approach story, character, and revealing clues.

We talked about how publishing contracts are changing, how difficult publishers are making it now for authors to get their "out of print" books back, and how the book tour, even on a small scale, is becoming a thing of the past.

And, of course, there were lots of discussions long into the night about the massive changes in the publishing industry,the rise of ebooks, and the influence of Amazon & the Kindle on every aspect of the business. Many authors were very curious about my self-pubishing experience (in light of this USA Today article), how the monthly DEAD MAN series on Amazon works, and what it was being published by Amazon's Thomas & Mercer imprint with KING CITY. There was lots of discussion about the pros and cons of self-publishing, about the merits and drawbacks of exclusivity with KDP Select (Amazon), and the potential and pitfalls of a new exclusivity deal quietly being pitched to some authors by Barnes & Noble.  Some of the folks I chatted with included Denise Hamilton, Thomas Perry, Boyd Morrison, John Rector, Cara Black, Robert Ward, Gar Anthony Haywood, Parnell Hall, D.P. Lyle, Craig Faustus Buck, Jan Burke, William Kent Krueger, Christine Goff, Dick Lochte, Robin Burcell, Janet Dawson, Twist Phelan, Johnny Shaw, Andrew Petersen, Naomi Hirahara,  Bill Fitzhugh, and Bruce De Silva, to name just a few.

The upshot of it all, at least from where I was sitting, is that authors see the ebook revolution as scary, exciting, and confusing…but ultimately empowering them in a way they have never been before. The authors I talked to, new and established alike, are radically rethinking many of their long-held beliefs about publishing, what it means to be published, and how they are measuring their own success. It's no longer a foregone conclusion that landing a book contract, even with a big 6 publisher, is necessarily the best move for many authors, particularly those in the mid-list, even if they are still enjoying success in print. Authors who never gave much thought before to the business side of publishing are now thinking about it a lot…and taking a longer view of rights, opportunities they may be signing away for an advance.  IMG_1130[1]

It was surprising to me to hear some of the disinformation that publishers are spreading. One author told me that she'd heard from her editor that Barry Eisler's Amazon experience turned out out be a huge disaster, that he regretted not taking St. Martin's $500,000 two-book deal, and that authors who'd once "sipped the Amazon Kool-Aid" were rushing back to legacy publishers in droves. That,  of course, couldn't be further from the truth but does illustrate just how terrified and desperate some editors in New York are now that they're realizing that they aren't the only game in town anymore…and that authors are becoming far more business savvy and many are flourishing without them. Publishers don't like seeing books that they rejected, or authors they dropped, or books they once published but fell out of print, now charging up the ebook bestseller lists.  

I also met many newly published authors and it was fascinating to hear their take on the business. And, of course, and I chatted with many readers, and I enjoyed getting to know them.

The most surprising thingof all is that I only bought six books… all vintage Harry Whittington paperbacks, snagged at $3-apiece.

All in all, it was a terrific conference.  

(pictured Craig Faustus Buck, Thomas Perry, DP Lyle)

Our FAVORITE KILLS

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Favorite Kills

We're back.

We hope you're sitting down, and that you've finally caught your breath from Top Suspense, our first bestselling anthology. You're about to take another screaming thrill ride with twelve master storytellers. Each Top Suspense Group author is an award winning, highly acclaimed pro whose compelling and unforgettable tales have been published all over the world—and, in some cases, have even become blockbuster movies and TV shows.

For Favorite Kills we've collected our very best short stories. All major prize-winning tales and personal favorites, each one a knock-out punch of suspense.

So hold on tight my friend, or better yet, tie yourself down. You're in for another breathtaking wild ride of seething sex and unexpected twists, dark humor, and certain death. And when it's all over, and you're sitting there spent and satisfied, soaked in a flop sweat of terror and exhilaration, we're gonna be right there to bring you even more.

The authors in Top Suspense are… Harry Shannon, Bill Crider, Vicki Hendricks, Naomi Hirahara, Stephen Gallagher, Max Allan Collins, Paul Levine, Libby Hellmann, Dave Zeltserman, Lee Goldberg, Joel Goldman, and Ed Gorman

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Edgar Nominees Announced

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I think this is a great list of nominees. I'm excited to see so many new names as opposed to the usual suspects. Kudos to the judges!

Mystery Writers of America is proud to announce on the 203rd anniversary of the birth of Edgar Allan Poe, its Nominees for the 2012 Edgar Allan Poe Awards, honoring the best in mystery fiction, non-fiction and television published or produced in 2011.  The Edgar® Awards will be presented to the winners at our 66th Gala Banquet, April 26, 2012 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel, New York, New York.

 
BEST NOVEL

The Ranger by Ace Atkins (Penguin Group USA – G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
Gone by Mo Hayder (Grove/Atlantic – Atlantic Monthly Press)
The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino (Minotaur Books)
1222 by Anne Holt (Simon & Schuster – Scribner)
Field Gray by Philip Kerr (Penguin Group USA – G.P. Putnam’s Sons – Marion Wood Books)
 

BEST FIRST NOVEL BY AN AMERICAN AUTHOR

Red on Red by Edward Conlon (Random House Publishing Group – Spiegel & Grau)
Last to Fold by David Duffy (Thomas Dunne Books)
All Cry Chaos by Leonard Rosen (The Permanent Press)
Bent Road by Lori Roy (Penguin Group USA – Dutton)
Purgatory Chasm by Steve Ulfelder (Minotaur Books – Thomas Dunne Books)
 

BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL

The Company Man by Robert Jackson Bennett (Hachette Book Group – Orbit Books)
The Faces of Angels by Lucretia Grindle (Felony & Mayhem Press)
The Dog Sox by Russell Hill (Pleasure Boat Studio – Caravel Mystery Books)
Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley (HarperCollins Publishers – Harper Paperbacks)
Vienna Twilight by Frank Tallis (Random House Trade Paperbacks)
 
 
BEST FACT CRIME

The Murder of the Century: The Gilded Age Crime That Scandalized a City and Sparked the Tabloid Wars by Paul Collins (Crown Publishing)
The Savage City: Race, Murder, and a Generation on the Edge by T.J. English (HarperCollins – William Morrow)
Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard (Random House – Doubleday)
Girl, Wanted: The Chase for Sarah Pender by Steve Miller (Penguin Group USA – Berkley)
The Man in the Rockefeller Suit: The Astonishing Rise and Spectacular Fall of a Serial Imposter by Mark Seal (Penguin Group USA – Viking)
 

BEST CRITICAL/BIOGRAPHICAL

The Tattooed Girl: The Enigma of Stieg Larsson and the Secrets Behind the Most Compelling Thrillers of our Time by Dan Burstein, Arne de Keijzer & John-Henri Holmberg (St. Martin’s Griffin)
Agatha Christie: Murder in the Making by John Curran (HarperCollins)
On Conan Doyle: Or, the Whole Art of Storytelling by Michael Dirda (Princeton University Press)
Detecting Women: Gender and the Hollywood Detective Film by Philippa Gates (SUNY Press)
Scripting Hitchcock: Psycho, The Birds and Marnie by Walter Raubicheck and Walter Srebnick (University of Illinois Press)

BEST SHORT STORY

"Marley’s Revolution" – Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine by John C. Boland (Dell Magazines)
"Tomorrow’s Dead" – Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine by David Dean (Dell Magazines)
"The Adakian Eagle" – Down These Strange Streets by Bradley Denton (Penguin Group USA – Ace Books)
"Lord John and the Plague of Zombies" – Down These Strange Streets by Diana Gabaldon (Penguin Group USA – Ace Books)
"The Case of Death and Honey" – A Study in Sherlock by Neil Gaiman (Random House Publishing Group – Bantam Books)
"The Man Who Took His Hat Off to the Driver of the Train" – Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine by Peter Turnbull (Dell Magazines)

BEST JUVENILE

Horton Halfpott by Tom Angleberger (Abrams – Amulet Books)
It Happened on a Train by Mac Barnett (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers)
Vanished by Sheela Chari (Disney Book Group – Disney Hyperion)
Icefall by Matthew J. Kirby (Scholastic Press)
The Wizard of Dark Street by Shawn Thomas Odyssey (Egmont USA)

BEST YOUNG ADULT

Shelter by Harlan Coben (Penguin Young Readers Group – G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson (Penguin Young Readers Group – G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
The Silence of Murder by Dandi Daley Mackall (Random House Children’s Books – Knopf BFYR)
The Girl is Murder by Kathryn Miller Haines (Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group – Roaring Creek Press)
Kill You Last by Todd Strasser (Egmont USA)
 
 
BEST PLAY

Sherlock Holmes and the Adventure of the Suicide Club by Jeffrey Hatcher (Arizona Theatre Company, Phoenix, AZ)
The Game’s Afoot by Ken Ludwig (Cleveland Playhouse, Cleveland, OH)
 

BEST TELEVISION EPISODE TELEPLAY

"Innocence" – Blue Bloods, Teleplay by Siobhan Byrne O’Connor (CBS Productions)
"The Life Inside" – Justified, Teleplay by Benjamin Cavell(FX Productions and Sony Pictures Television)
"Part 1" – Whitechapel, Teleplay by Ben Court & Caroline Ip (BBC America)
"Pilot" – Homeland, Teleplay by Alex Gansa, Howard Gordon & Gideon Raff (Showtime)
"Mask" – Law & Order: SVU, Teleplay by Speed Weed (Wolf Films/Universal Media Studios)
 
 
ROBERT L. FISH MEMORIAL AWARD

"A Good Man of Business" – Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine by David Ingram (Dell Magazines)
 

GRAND MASTER

Martha Grimes
 

RAVEN AWARDS

M is for Mystery Bookstore, San Mateo, CA
Molly Weston, Meritorious Mysteries
 

ELLERY QUEEN AWARD
                                                                                           
Joe Meyers of the Connecticut Post/Hearst Media News Group

THE SIMON & SCHUSTER – MARY HIGGINS CLARK AWARD
(Presented at MWA’s Agents & Editors Party on Wednesday, April 25, 2012)

Now You See Me by S.J. Bolton (Minotaur Books)
Come and Find Me by Hallie Ephron (HarperCollins Publishers – William Morrow)
Death on Tour by Janice Hamrick (Minotaur Books)
Learning to Swim by Sara J. Henry (Crown Publishing Group)
Murder Most Persuasive by Tracy Kiely (Minotaur Books – Thomas Dunne Books)

Behind the Music: Mr. Monk On Patrol

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MR_MONK_ON_PATROL (2)Mr. Monk on Patrol, my 13th original Monk novel, is out today in bookstores everywhere…and it's very much a story about change. 

 Adrian Monk, the obsessive-compulsive detective, and his assistant Natalie Teeger travel to New Jersey to help out former SFPD detective Randy Disher, who is now Chief of Police of Summit and living with Sharona Fleming, Monk's previous assistant.  But the story is about much more than that…or the reunion with beloved characters…or the complex murders that Monk eventually solves.

I have always had a lot of  fun writing the Monk books, but most of the time, I was constrained by having to stick to the continuity of the TV series (which I also occasionally wrote for). That changed with the finale of the TV show, which really shook things up and liberated me  to let the characters evolve in new and exciting ways…and to even introduce a few new, regular characters. It also freed me to pay off some of the character arcs that began early the novel series, which started back in 2006 with Mr. Monk Goes to the Firehouse (which I adapted with William Rabkin into the episode "Mr. Monk Can't See a Thing"). 

I believe that characters in a series become stale if they don’t grow and that readers, and the author, will become bored with them. At the same time, you want to remain true to what makes the characters, the relationships, and the "franchise" so special. 

It's a delicate balance. And here's how I've tried to maintain it.

The Monk books are narrated by Natalie. I chose that approach because I think it humanizes Monk. It gives us a necessary distance. Natalie’s eyes become the replacement for the camera lens that gave us our point of view on the TV version of Adrian Monk. Also, a little Monk goes a long way. You can overdo the joke and all the obsessive/compulsive stuff. By telling the stories from Natalie’s point of view, we aren’t with him all the time. We get some space, a breather from his phobias and ticks, and I think that’s important. 

But there's a side benefit. It’s allowed me to add an emotional resonance to the story-lines that goes beyond just Monk’s eccentricities and the solving of puzzling mysteries. The underlying theme of the books (and yes, there's always one) are often reflected in whatever is happening in Natalie’s life. Her personal story frames the way in which she perceives the mystery and reacts to Monk, so it’s all of a piece. It’s allowed me to make her a deeper, more interesting, and more realistic character. By doing that, I make Monk more dimensional as well, and I can ground the story in what I like to think of as “a necessary reality.”

Without that reality, Monk would just be a caricature and cartoon character. Natalie humanizes Monk and makes the world that the two of them live in believable to the reader. Through her, we are able to invest emotionally in the story. Without that crucial element, I believe the books would have failed.

Since we are in Natalie's head, we get to know her. And the more time you spend with someone, the deeper your relationship should become. So that's what I've tried to do with the reader's relationship with her. With that depth should come growth.
So, as your relationship with her grew and evolved, so did hers with Adrian Monk. I felt if I did it that way, the changes in their characters and the evolution in their relationship would all feel natural and inevitable. 

Natalie is a smart woman and I didn’t think she could stick with Monk, and keep investigating murders, if she didn’t find it fascinating herself. And I doubted she could do it for so long without picking up some skills along the way. It’s an arc I've been developing with her since Mr. Monk and The Dirty Cop, the eighth book in the series, and that pays off in a big way now in Mr. Monk On Patrol.  
The relationship between Monk and Natalie changes dramatically in this book…and yet I believe it's a natural extension of events in both the TV series and the last few books. This change has major consequences that impact all of the other characters in their world and that carries over directly into the next book in the series, Mr. Monk is a Mess, coming in July 2012, and that leads into the finale of the book series. 
Well, at least my involvement in it. I decided while writing Mr. Monk on Patrol that I was going to leave the series at the end of my current contract. My good friend Andy Breckman, the creator of Monk, and my publishers have kindly allowed me to write a finale, one that leaves the door open should they decide to continue the book series someday with another writer. 

I hope you enjoy Mr. Monk on Patrol. I certainly had a great time writing it!   

 

Doing the Unthinkable

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0383 Lee Goldberg ecover King City_14There was a turning point when I realized that I’d completely shaken free of all of my previous, deeply held perceptions and beliefs about publishing….and fully embraced an entirely new publishing model.

It wasn’t when my out-of-print backlist, which the publishing industry deemed played out and worthless, started pulling in $70,000 a year for me in ebook royalties.

It wasn’t when I signed a 12-book digital, print and audio deal with Amazon’s 47North imprint for The Dead Man, a monthly series of original books that Bill Rabkin & I created, and that we are writing with a dozen incredibly talent authors, and that we began in February as a self-publishing venture.

And it wasn’t last week, when I agreed to a two-book digital-print-audio deal with Amazon’s Thomas & Mercer imprint for my new novel King City and a sequel.

It was Tuesday, when I delivered Mr. Monk is a Mess, my 14th Monk tie-in novel to Penguin/Putnam and informed them that my 15th book, the last in my current contract and due this coming May, would also be my last book in the series.

In other words,  I quit.

They were surprised, of course.

I am walking away from a hugely successful book series, one published in multiple languages around the world, and from the certainty of another three-book contract and an increase in my advance.

There was a time, not so long ago, when the idea of ending a hit book series, in hardcover, with a major publisher would have been inconceivable to me and just about every author I know.

But the publishing world has completely changed.

The Monk books, like the Diagnosis Murder novels that I wrote before, were licensed tie-ins. That means I was hired for an advance, and given a tiny royalty, to write books based on characters that belong to someone else. I was a hired hand…albeit one paid very well by tie-in standards.

I had a great fun writing those books, took enormous pride in them and, until recently, considered myself very fortunate to have the gig.

And in that old world, I was.

But now, in this new world, my attitude has completely changed.  0460 Lee Goldberg Dead Man Series_V2_3

I am still very proud of the books…which is why I find it incredibly frustrating that I have written 22 novels that I dearly love but that don’t belong to me.

They belong to studios.

It’s frustrating because if they belonged to me, I could be earning so much more money from them now…and, more importantly for my family, in the future.

I won’t make that mistake again.

Instead of writing two books a year for Penguin/Putman, I will be writing that many books… or more…for myself that I own.

Some I will self-publish, others I will write for Amazon’s imprints.

But they will be mine.

I know what you’re thinking. What about those books for Amazon? Haven’t you just traded one master for another?

Every aspect of  the deals that I have with Amazon’s imprints on The Dead Man series and the King City books are far, far, FAR more author-friendly and potentially lucrative than anything I ever had before…as are my chances at success with such a savvy partner, one who, incidentally, operates the biggest and most successful bookstore on the planet.

And I own King City. If I end up writing 15 books in that series, all of those books, now and in the future, will be mine.

Ah, but what about all those writers who are doing The Dead Man books for us? Aren’t we exploiting them? Aren’t they making the same mistake I’d have made if I’d signed to do more Monk books?

Nope.  

That’s because unlike the old school publishers (and, let’s face it, publishers are what Bill and I have become with The Dead Man), we have thrown away the old rules of doing business with writers on licensed properties.

In fact, what we are doing is revolutionary in the tie-in world.

We are splitting all of the publishing royalties from digital, print, audio, and foreign translations on The Dead Man books 50/50 with the writers.

Our success is their success…and vice-versa.

We’ve made them our partners.

(And publishers of tie-ins should follow our lead…or there won’t be any tie-ins anymore, because it won’t make any financial sense for writers to write them).

The Dead Man series relaunched on Oct. 24th and is already doing amazing business. Our next book comes out later this month.

And King City is coming in May.

It’s a bold, exciting new world for authors and I haven’t been this excited about writing since I was a teenager.